Later that night, we're on the couch, sitting close enough that our shoulders and thighs are touching, enough that I notice and it makes me unfocused. Dres has picked the movie Chef, which has been on Netflix for months now, though I haven't bothered to watch it. I don't know why, because it's pretty funny.

     Not that I can enjoy it. I'm distracted the whole movie. There's this weird feeling between us, like loose energy, electrons that have broken orbit bouncing between us. Feels exactly like how I imagine unfinished business would feel if it were a solid object. And yeah, okay, I really wasn't kidding about the whole blue balls thing, so maybe I'm feeling that, too.

     "You were actually quiet through the movie," Dres says his tone light, as the room goes dark with the credits rolling on the screen.

     "Yeah well," I say with a sigh, because I don't really know what I mean to say. Dres glances at me. He doesn't really know what I mean to say, either. So I go with, "Did you enlist because of your dad?"

     He's not looking at me, so I get my favorite view of him, profile with a sharp jaw and tattoos that swirl around his neck. Also, I totally gave him a hickey, which gives me latent joy. His expression gives nothing away. "Is that what you were thinking about for the past two hours?"

     I shake my head, responding in a low voice, "You don't want to know what I was thinking about for the last two hours." My voice gives everything away. 

     He doesn't grin but I catch the quirk in the side of his mouth. He's quiet so I give him a minute, turning to look at my hands in my lap.

     When I start to wonder if maybe I said the wrong thing, he says, "Not exactly." I wait again, because 'not exactly' is not exactly an answer. "My dad caught me with a boy. He thought having me join the army would...cure me. He told Dolores that the war would 'kick the queer out of me'."

     Fuck, and I thought my dad was bad.

     "But, ultimately, it was my decision. I was eighteen. He couldn't force me to enlist." Before I can ask him why, he adds, "So I did it to show him that this is who I am, that a unifom wouldn't change. I suspect now he didn't think it would. Maybe he wanted the military to shame me into hiding myself, or maybe he thought I'd get killed for it. Either way, I never hid that part of myself and I didn't enlist because of him. That first tour was for me."

     "And the last two?" I ask quietly.

     Dres falters for a second. "Are complicated."

     I think about what my mom said. Why had Dres named his place Private Weston?

     We sit in silence because I don't ask him even though I think I should.

     It isn't until my mom's car pulls into the driveway that we move, both turning to the window as her headlights illuminate the room. I say, "That's my mom." I think no shit. A few seconds later I hear the car door slam. "If she asks, under no circumstances did we go upstairs. She'll probably ask. So when she asks."

     Dres turns to look at me, expression suddenly heated with his eyes in slits. "We weren't supposed to go—." He stops when the front door opens and I look over the couch as my mom walks through the foyer.

     "Hey mom," I say with what I hope is a casual, easy-breezy tone.

     She looks at me and I don't know if it's just me but she's eyeing me down like a detective. "Hello Dresden," she says as she walks in. Dres immediately stands, going to greet my mom. I roll my eyes as they exchange a light hug because apparently they've upgraded from awkward handshakes to whatever that is.

     "So I received a confirmation email from Coach Stevens for your team visit. He attached the plane tickets and your itinerary for the week. I forwarded it to you."

     I say, quite bluntly, "What are you talking about?" Possibly too bluntly, but I have a feeling I know exactly what she's talking about.

     She's moved to her study, setting down her things at her desk, and turns around to look at me through the doorway. "I told you last week the coach at USC reached out to me. He wants you to check out the university. The team —."

     "I'm not flying to California in the middle of the week for a school I don't even intend to go to, mom. That's actually crazy."

     Out of the corner of my eye, I see Dres shift uncomfortably and I realize this is not the time to be having this conversation with her. I really can't fathom what the hell she is thinking, though.

     She stares at me with a hardened expression. "Everything is already arranged. They're covering all the expenses. And your coach reached out to your teachers so you don't have to worry about missing class."

     I'm glaring at her as I get up. "I'm going to walk Dres out." I circle the couch and follow Dres out of the room. He doesn't say anything as I get his jacket from the hall closet, but he tugs on the bottom of my shirt when he walks out the front door so I follow him. I close the door behind me for privacy.

     He leans against one of the wooden beams of the front porch, arms crossed as he stares at me thoughtfully.

     I frown, slightly, urged to speak by his deliberate silence. "She had no business setting that up." Dres still doesn't say anything, just stares at me, his eyes wide but soft. I glance down at my phone as I open the plane ticket attachment. "I'm literally going to miss school all week. I have a meet on Thursday. Friday we get to wear our Halloween costumes to school. And what about work?"

    Dres raises an eyebrow slowly, inquisitively. "What about work?"

     I scroll to the return ticket. "I don't come back until Sunday night! Are you kidding me? I get one day, one measly freaking day with you and it's being taken away for what? This is absurd. I'm not even considering the school. I literally couldn't care less about USC. And you know what it says about them requesting five days? It says they know they suck and they need more time to convince me."

     Dres holds my gaze, mouth twisted to the side, and I stare back, questioningly, wondering what he's going to say. Probably something like it's not so bad.

     "One measly day? You see me everyday."

     Or that.

     "Yeah I see you everyday, but I get you on Sundays. All of you is fully mine. All I've got are Sundays. It's one day out of the week and it takes five hundred freaking years to get here. Now I have to give it up for a school I don't even care about. Which means I'm not going to see you for two freaking weeks."

     Maybe I'm being unreasonable. Maybe I sound crazy.

     "You'll see me tomorrow."

     Okay, so I definitely sound crazy.

     "You're not addressing my concerns whatsoever."

      Dres is quiet for a second. He uncrosses his arms and shoves his hands into the pockets of his jacket. "Saturday night."

     "I don't get back until Sunday night, Dres. Did you not here any of my lament?"

     He's smiling now. "You said all you've got are Sundays, so I'm saying you can have Saturday nights, too."

     I furrow my brows. "What about work?"

     Dres raises an eyebrow again. "What about work?"

     I make a growly sound. "I really dislike when you answer my questions with a question."

     He stops leaning against the beam, stepping closer to me. "Keep an open mind about the school," he says softly, ignoring what I just said completely. "California's not so bad."

     "You've been?" I ask, my breath a white cloud in the small space between us.

     He nods. "Yeah, I have." He pauses and his expression changes, becomes cheeky. "Been to Pittsburgh, too."

     My jaw drops a little. "You've been to Pittsburgh? And you didn't even... and I told you it was my favorite city."

     "You really weren't trying to be subtle, were you?"

     I grin ear to ear. "So you watched Queer as Folk?"

     He nods, his expression almost sheepish. "I did. Binged it in nearly one weekend." Something about the fact Dres just referred to binge watching and also the mental image of him lying in bed with a laptop binge-watching my favorite show makes me feel like I'm suddenly from Venus, too, even though I don't have a jacket on and it's bone-freezing cold outside.

     "And you didn't say anything?" I exclaim. "Tell me you loved the series. I mean, of course you loved it. What's not to love? But what'd you think? It was so ahead of its time, right?"

     He nods, not nearly as enthusiastic a response as I was looking for. "Yeah, I liked it."

     I say slyly, "We're basically Justin and Brian."

     He rolls his eyes. "No, we aren't."

     "We really are. You just have to call me Sunshine."

     Dres's expression is unenthused. "I'm leaving now."

     "Wait," I say as he turns to go. He looks back at me expectantly. "You're not going to kiss me goodnight?"

     If his expression was unenthused before, I don't know what it is now but I'm highly enjoying it. "Do you want me to kiss you goodnight?"

     "Dres," I say, kind of offended by the question. "If I had it my way, we'd kiss all the time. Everywhere we went. There wouldn't be a moment where we weren't kissing. They'd have to use a forklift to pry us apart. I wouldn't even schedule in breaks for eating and sleeping we'd just kiss all the—."

     Dres has closed the space between us before I can even finish my second lament of the night (seriously, I'm on a roll here.) He grabs a handful of my shirt, pulling me to him, as he shoves me back against the door. The whole motion is sort of disorienting but I've got his mouth on mine and that anchors me.

     I slide my arms into his jacket, around his back pulling him closer because he is so warm and I am actually frozen. The only thing warmer than being inside Dres's jacket is having my hands up the back of his shirt. And now I'm trying to figure out why we stopped upstairs in my bedroom before clothes came off. What possessed us to watch a movie? (Dres possessed us, of course. "It's getting late and I still haven't gotten my movie.") (Next time I'll be more specific when I plan our date. "Dinner and sex, lots and lots of sex," I'll say.)

     Dres grabs at my forearms, returns my hands back to my person as he pulls away and then takes a step back. "You always get ahead of yourself. This is why you can't have goodnight kisses."

     "You're so right. I can't have goodnight kisses. It should be goodnight make-outs." I go back in, but Dres still has me by my arms and keeps me at length. I glower. I did not account for being more sexually frustrated now that I've got Dres than when I didn't.

     "You got Saturday evenings. You can't have it all," he says.

     "Sure I can. Like this." I attempt to push through his hold again but Dres is strong. It's not going to happen. It's never going to happen. I can't help but think this kind of grip could make sexy time things even sexier.

     "Go inside," he says.

     "So bossy. You're more a Mr. Grey than a Brian Kinney."

     "Keep comparing me to fictional characters and you're going to regret it."

     The threat immediately takes me back to the kitchen, with Dres pressed up against me and his mouth on my neck. It's a mental image that delivers like a shot right to my dick.

     "You know, it really gets me hot when you threaten me like that."

     He looks at me like he wants to retort but opts for a frustrated sigh instead, rolling his eyes all the way to his truck.

     When I'm back inside my mom is standing right there by the stairs like she's been waiting there this whole time. I glare at her. "This is so unfair. I'm missing Halloween and my date with Dres. I get one day with that boy—."

     "Dres is not a boy," she says her tone icy cold. Which annoys me because she has no reason to be mad. I'm the one being forced across the country to visit a school I couldn't care less about.

     "You're so right. Dres is a man. Debatably the hottest man alive. Undoubtedly the hottest man I'll ever date. And you, evil monster mom –."

     "You're being so dramatic about this," she interrupts.

     I shake my head furiously. "I'm going to be gone for five days. What about school?"

     She raises an eyebrow. "What about school?"

     I make a fierce sound. "Oh my god, are you and Dres trading notes or something? My god." I start stomping up the stairs.

     "I can't stand when you get all teen angsty on me, Calvin."

     "Good," I call back before I slam my bedroom door.